Who's in the market for a whack looking phone with some sort of flip-out hybrid keyboard-screen? You are? Then the LG Doubleplay is singing your song. Check this... thing... out:

Don't worry. I gagged, too.

The Doubleplay will most likely be a low-end phone, judging by the reported 320x480 display and weak 5MP camera. That doesn't keep it from being unique though, with a secondary LCD that will probably serve very little practical purpose embedded right in the middle of the keyboard. Still, there may be some sort of target audience for this device -- tweeners, perhaps? Smartphone newcomers? Honestly, I'm not sure that this phone is a good idea for anyone, let along smartphone first-timers.

Either way, if you happen to be one of the four people considering picking up this handset, the word on the street is that November 2nd for $150 with a two-year contract is the time and price for this little bundle of bizarre.

Comments

If there would be any chance at all that they worked together with developers to make the second screen useful, then it might have been something "fun". But that will prob never happen.

Jer

Good god...horrendous

darkharlequin

Pretty much unless this thing can run a nintendo DS emulator, I see no point. No apps will be made to take advantage of the second screen. Space could have been better used for touch sensors like the xperia play or....anything else.

Hooolm

Brilliant device for the kind of user who sees something like this and thinks, "Hey, cool, it has an extra screen in the middle of the keyboard instead of a proper keyboard!"

Androd

Yep...2012 is just around the corner...the end of the world has come!

jmo

I can't totally hate on this design idea. It definitely makes playing Nintendo DS games on your phone plausible.

Coco hime

Ok, I know the second screen looks terrible and is probably useless as well. But on a positive note, I think that keyboard looks absolutely great. Everything looks nicely spaced and easy to press considering it's losing half it's area to the second screen.

*sigh* I miss physical keyboards,

Karl

Looks like that old Helio Ocean

engineerGA

I actually like the idea. But, I don't need the physical keyboard - I just wish it had a bigger (4x4 icons/widgets) extra display down there instead, where I could drop apps and widgets that are always visible - like a "favorites list" of content. Whenever I needed the on-screen keyboard to pop up, it could pop up down there instead and not cover 3/4 of the top screen like it does now. That would be awesome. Like a soft keyboard, but it turns into a homescreen when I don't "need" a keyboard.

taylord

They should ditch the dualie keyboard/screen for a fold out full size qwerty keyboard. Now that'd be cool.

Ahmad Nadeem

Is this really a phone?????? I first thought its a new nintendo ds :D

savedr

If this thing had any kind of good processor in it and a high-res screen, I'd be all the crap over it. I am one of those people that absolutely loves the split-key Microsoft Natural keyboard, this excites me just for that reason.

this phone is not ugly and very innovative. doesnt look bulky like the kyocera echo and has average specs. shouldve made it dual core tho, at least.

anyway i can see some good uses for this phone: good for artists who need a reference photo on the second screen, good for students who work on essays on their phones who need to read a document or look at the web on another screen, good for the casual IM chatter or text messager who likes to browse the web or whatever while chatting, good for people who like to multitask in general. sometimes its annoying closing apps just to quickly check on something. i do all of those things lol so i mite be interested in this phone if only the specs were better...